Mental Illness-the enemy within

My parents were the true heroes in the fight for mental wellness. And I am trying to carry on. Looking back I did not give either of them the credit they deserved. My father, living with bipolar 2 disorder, for being a successful business man, able to put two children through university and live to welcome 5 grandchildren. My mother, for being able to stand by him all those years; never letting on that there was something wrong with my dad. Holding him up when he was so down. And never saying a word.

Mental illness was greeted with silence back then because mental illness was more often seen as a moral failure than a brain disease, which it most certainly is. Sadly, too many still believe that all one has to do is pull up one’s socks.

I am third generation, on my father’s side, with a mental illness. I wasn’t diagnosed until my fifties. I have chronic recurrent depression with anxiety. My psychiatrist told me I was one check mark away from being diagnosed with bipolar 2. That means some days I am just fine. But others, the depression grabs me without warning and I never know how long it will be my companion. I will get up in the morning surrounded by a darkness that cannot be seen; only felt. A need to cry; all for no reason. A sense of hopelessness and helplessness. It is a sadness so deep and wide there are times when I can’t believe I will find my way out. It takes all my energy to function. And that is exhausting. I think about people dealing with obsessive compulsive disorders-thoughts or actions- the amount of energy they exert fighting frightening thoughts or trying not to repeat actions over and over, actions that have no purpose.

Most people I meet have no idea that I have depression. I have become quite a good actor as have so many others living with mental illness. We smile, we laugh, we participate in conversations when we really want to go home and curl up and cry or pull up the blankets and sleep. And far too many live in silence for fear of being feared.

We fear being feared because too many people attribute evil events to the mentally ill. I have lost track of the number of times I have heard politically correct arrogant pundits and politicians declare when a terror attack occurs that the person must be mentally ill-I mean only someone mentally ill would do such a thing. Well, no. Terrorists are evil and evil must never be conflated with mental illness. Most of us self-harm. Many cut themselves. How dare these “journalists” cast aspersions on millions of us who fight the enemy within on a regular basis?It is enough that we fight the battle within; to do battle with others is overwhelming.

And then there was the kerfuffle regarding President Trump when the left wing media tried to paint him as a “madman.”

“Only those completely under his spell can deny what growing numbers of Americans have long suspected: The president of the United States is profoundly unstable,” the editorial said. “He is mad. He is, by any honest layman’s definition, mentally unwell.”

And once again we witnessed the horrific failure of others to help the mentally ill. Parkland, Florida.